A Bus Ride with Alperon - part 2/2

{Continued from part one}

< Music back on >
...

As he reached the first row, DPF Martins repeated the same procedure with Dona Natalia, but then further asked her to lean forward so that he can also touch a point on her lower back.

Then, without warning, his quiet demeanour flipped over in one second - he told her to get off the bus, and has she took a second or two to move, he strongly shouted at her, and now Tia Patricia was part of this as well. In 30 seconds he got them both off the bus with their parcels, heading down to get their checked-in baggage for inspection.

As a detailed search was likely taking place somewhere outside the bus, the rest of us were seating and waiting. The Don - husband or not - did not choose to go out in support and expose himself and his relation. Instead he jumped in and out of the seat, restlessly walked back and forth, checked the windows, and in between - crossed himself a couple of times more, just in case the relevant god forgot how faithful a follower he is.

Now, I knew that something was wrong - and various thoughts started running in my mind. However, I kept "reading my book" and listening to music.

While Don Raymundo was up and down the isle, I could see at the corner under my window one of Matins` staff methodologically going through what seemed to be the Dona`s bag, throwing staff piece by piece out onto the pavement.  From what I could see, there was not much of interest there.

After sometime more, someone else from the federal police came onboard the bus, and asked for the passenger in what I thought was seat #10 (The Don`s seat). After some confusion across the passengers, and a repetition of the request, Rafael behind me identified himself. He was told to grab his staff and come off the bus as well.

I realized that the Don - and what by now I figured was likely a whole bunch of "associates" on the bus - know that I know.  If nothing else, I know that he`s connected to Dona Natalia and Tia Patricia, and that the police might want to search his staff as well. As I was starting to consider the imminent attack (on myself), I was ferociously going through my memory to try  and collect a few moves out of old kung-fu movie scenes, and to recollect something of that Karate-kata I memorized when I was about 12 and aiming at a yellow belt some day.

I came out of it with some noises from the front. Another one of Matins` was now going through a search at the seats of the Dona and the Aunt. At the seat behind it, a father and little son passengers were amusing themselves at the show, leaning forward over the seat in front to observe the futile search.  This is when I realized that this was obviously no random block or search. The police knew that there is something they are not finding, and seemed to know who was hiding it as well. And yet, they were for some reason not able to connect the Don to it (nothing touches the Don).

And suddenly I remembered. Earlier in the trip, soon after we departed, I saw Tia Patricia hanging something on the window, behind a window curtain, and "wrapping" the curtain around it to fully conceal it. At the time I figured it for her purse or something similar, and remember thinking it was not the brightest idea, as myself (and basically anyone else seating behind her) could clearly see her do that. But the young police officer conducting the search did not see her do that.  "Check out the friggin` curtain" I was mind-transmitting, but to no avail. "How amateur are you to not check out the curtain? There is a huge blip there, like an erection waiting to be found". No help. The young officer concluded the search and went off the bus.

Apparently, the Don remembered that move as well, and as soon as the officer cleared the bus, he made a cobra-like move to the curtain, grabbing it - only that for some reason he went for the wrong one (out of two options) and didn`t continue to check/ grab the other one. My anxiety levels went up - now I also knew where they were hiding whatever it was, and everytime the Don`s eyes passed somewhere in my vicinity got a serious chill down my spine.  I was definitely not going through the Don to try talk to the police, and the police did not seem interested to take a few passengers to the side and try questioning us.

I guess around that point I realized that I was staring at the same page for the last 30 mins or so, so gave up on the reading attempt.  Under my window, a police officer was now going through Rafael`s bags. This time, it did not take long before he found some contraband in a bag - what seemed to be a 1GB graphic-cards or just 1GB HD. The searching officer looked up at Rafael like a reprimanding teacher, nodding his head disapprovingly. I could almost hear the "tsk tsk tsk". In no time, there were two 1-meter-high piles of trafficked PC equipment standing on the pavement. The young officer took Rafael`s I.D., and carried with him the contraband to the other side of the bus, indicating for Rafael to follow.

A few minutes later, Rafael was back on the bus, reporting the developments to Don Raymundo. The Don of course, showed some Don-like concern to his flock, but Rafael assured him it`s nothing of concern: "it`s a first violation". I realized that was it, and the police were definitely losing this one.

Soon enough, the two ladies were back on the bus as well, and before the Don had much of a chance to to question them, Dona Natalia went for the curtain, took out a black square plastic bag and moved with it quickly towards the end of the bus. Might be just my imagination, given what I was reading, but the bag looked the perfect size to contain a 1 kg bag of sugar.  Now they were all on the bus, conferring back and forth. I figured at least a couple of more fellas were a part of the group. Soon enough, the bus got on its way and I was left with trying to figure out what kind of kung-fu move will be of any help if they pull an Orient Express on me.

Not much later, the bus pulled to a stop again. This time - a planned stop for dinner. The familia made sure they are not leaving the bus before everybody else, and only then did Don Raymundo leave the two ladies on the bus, and went to eat like a lion starved for a week.

Eventually we continued. I got back to some more reading, and finally, somehow fell asleep - with the Don at my side, and with hopes of waking up again to tell the story.

At some point in the morning I indeed woke up again, to find the Don and myself lying shoulder to shoulder, Don Raymundo leaning towards me, gently snoring into my ear.

As we arrived at the station, and were lining up to get our checked-in bags, I went paparazzi on the whole lot. Just in case. Other than the Don, of course - he was nowhere to be found close to the bags, and instead, was watching from a distance (nothing touches the Don).

Epilogue
A few questions were piling up in my head during the events, other than those of self-survival.

There is of course the morale question of what I was supposed to do, which I will leave at that, though I`m sure many readers would have something to say this way or that.

An interesting one for me, is what would have happened if the same was to take place in Israel instead (or another country). I`m thinking, everybody outside the gang would have jumped to the police to help identify the Don and the bag (or the way would go boom). But then again, if it seemed like a matter of Mafia and trafficking contraband - I am not so sure.

And then of course, a bunch of issues with the execution from Martins` team - fail!

For one, they obviously had quite specific intel. Why then rely on seat numbers, and not get some names/ pictures to go with that?  Fail
Why not just get someone from the team as a "passenger" on the bus?  Fail
They obviously could do with some more creativity on the search front.  Fail
And what was that with asking for a volunteer to come down as #10 from the front of the bus?  Where did Martins` "control the arena" go?  Fail
Finally, if you might come back on the bus to search or look for someone else (you`ve been in these situations before, surely) - leave someone from the team on the bus until you´re fully done.
 Fail.

Again, if anybody understands some of the nuances and context better than me, and can help with some insights - please do let me know.

A Bus Ride with Alperon - part 1/2

{Alperon is one of the famous Israeli Crime families. The name is burrowed here for the purpose of the Title only, and my own associations during it}

As I was sitting in the bus terminal in Foz do Iguacu, awaiting my night bus to Porto Alegre, I was considering the very low chances that there will be any real "story" to tell once I`m back.

Finishing my 4th day here (not including the very unevetnful 40-hours flight sequence), all I have to speak of is the Iguacu waterfalls - with a possible detailes-but-boring report on the views, comparing the Brazilian and Argentinian sides as advice for future travellers - and in between anecdotes on the worst "steak" ever (in Curitiba), a mouth-watering excellent steak in AQVA on the argentinian side, and a super-cheap eatery experience.

The road ahead is not very promising in this respect either - I`m heading to Porto Alegre next - a big blank city in the south with nothing much of interest according to all accounts so far, in a state that just experienced a club-disaster with over 200 youngsters dead and a one-month-long mourning declared for the city.  Following that, the outlook basically includes Florianopólis beaches (sand, ocean, cerveja, Cuba Libre, Caipirinha and likely an excessive dosage of Forro) followed by the Rio Carnaval (street, Parade, cerveja, Cuba Libre, Caipirinha and Samba).

 Then came the time to board the bus ...
{In the following, I randomly assign names to a few characters in an attempt to reduce confusion}

My first encounter with the Don was not the best of beginnings.
"You`re in my seat", I tried putting together a few words in Portuguese towards a couple that was occupying the 2-seater including my designated window-seat. The bus was still mostly empty.

The woman seemed somewhat confused/ questioning, so apologetically showing her my ticket, I added "ach`que sim" (I think so).

The guy, who I assumed was the husband/ boyfriend, explained to her that they have the two consecutive aisle seats, and hurried to free up the seat for me. I dumped my bag on the seat and went out the bus. When I got back, I only saw the guy, and offered him to exchange if they prefer, as for me it`s all the same. He dismissed the offer for some reason: "Nao, tranquillo".

At that point I noticed the butcher`s forearms along with a non-specific general feeling (possibly connected to the choice of tranquillo) that made me idiotically repeat that I really really would not mind changing places.

Last minute, a guy came on the bus, no-sleeve shirt showing off tattooed muscled arms, and sat right behind me, next to Don (Ricardo) Raymundo. "Well, no big loss for not making the change", I figured.

Soon, the bus got on its way, the Don joined me at his apparently-now-official seat, and started praying. Seemed as if he was going through a full chapter of prayer, and repeatedly crossed himself - finishing each time with a little kiss to the crossing hand.

Once he was done, he moved to the seats at the front of the bus, where I realized Senhora Dona Natalia (the wife) was now sitting with a woman that seemed to be another family member - Tia (aunt) Patricia.

Seeing Ricardo standing there over the ladies, something about the mixture of the family-head stance, along with the somehow familiar face, butcher forearms, and the completely unexpected religious angle made something drop in my mind - I`ve seen this before. On TV.
"I`m on the bus with Alperon (/Aberjil/ Abutbul)", I smiled to my own self-amusement and my developed imagination - obviously I was hungry for a story. Then I went on to my reading and music routine.

Over the next hour or so, the Don kept jumping between Dona Natalia`s, myself, the seat behind me for a chat with Rafael, or to one of the free seats around.  "Something`s wrong with the dude" I was amusing, but still gave it to my free-association along with the influence of me going through a Frederic Forsyth novel about fighting a colombian drug cartel. We then hit a "random roadblock" by the Federal Brazilian Police. Been in these before - a 10-min nuisance, I figured as I readied my passport for a police-check.  The Don joined me again at our seat - apparently better to seat at your desginated place for these checks.

{If one of my Brazilian friends can let me know what these checks are normally about - it should be revealing. Specifically, what`s the deal with all them "travel documents" I keep seeing people present as they board inter-state buses?}

We were idling at some station on the road-side for about 5 minutes, when the bus doors finally opened.

With 15 years in the Brazilian army forces before transferring to the Military Police`s BOPE division (Batalhão de Operações Policiais Especiais - Special Police Operations Battalion) 10 years ago, Lieutenant Colonel (Tenente-coronel) Martins has seen quite a lot by now. In the last couple of years he`s been in charge of trying to put some level of control over the trafficking madness in south Brazil. For this task, he was temporarily assigned to the Policia Federal as a Special commisionner seconded for this missions to the Regional Superintendent. As such, he was referred to as DPF Martins.

There is not much of custom control across the borders at Gaucho land - borders with Argentina and Paraguay are notoriously open for moving merchandize across without interruption and at minimum risk, and for reasons of international diplomacy that are apparently above his pay-grade, nobody seems to be planning to do anything to change that.  This was not a big issue before, as the damage was mainly around some Brazilian vacationers visiting the falls in Iguacu or the south Pantanal (Campo Grande), and dropping by to the Paraguaian border-cities for some "duty free" shopping. With time, and with the Brazilian economy, the Real and prices thriving, more and more gangs have taken an interest in the opportunities. From here, merchandize quickly makes its way to urban centers like Curitiba, Porto Alegre, and Sao Paulo, and include fake PC, mobile and camera equipment, and recently - a spike in drugs.
As the fight against drug trafficking made it more difficult for air and sea smugglers, this "hole in the fence" was too tempting, and recently a considerably higher percentage of the trafficking of drugs is moving through land routes.

If the intel he had was right, today his team would score a big hit towards putting a hole into that business. One kg of cocaine is small in the bigger context of things, but could make or break a smaller gang, add some question marks about the ease of using the route for other gangs, and no less important - bring back some pride and motivation to his team.

< music on >

As he walked into the bus, DPF Martins owned the Arena. Looking as if he came out from a classic Brasilian TV drama series, confident, erect, his short white beard neatly trimmed, it was pretty clear who is in charge, and other than his neatly tucked-in T-shirt announcing "Policia Federal", there was no need to explain anything to anyone on the bus. Just in case anyone misinterprets his calm demeanour, 2 extra magazines for his semi-automatic gun are on display clipped to his wide belt, hinting at the capcity for a quick turnover to efficient vioence. Without a word, Martins walks down the aisle, taking in every detail in the arena, measuring, calculating, contemplating scenarios. All done very quietly, as in "the quiet before the storm", as in the sea quietly and gently pulling back just before throwing ashore a huge powerful and violent tsunami.

Myself, other than a glance, I went back to my book, figuring it will be faster than I figured, given that they were not even checking ID`s. To my right, though, Don Raymundo felt somewhat tense, starting to somewhat fidget in his seat.

Martins was slowly making his way from the back to the front, and as he reached us - again without a word - he reached down to the direction of the Don`s crothch after a small indication to let him. He seemed to be reaching towards the lower belly area just above the crotch, softly touching the Don once on the right side and once on the left with his finger. He continued to me, repeating the same on the right side alone, and moving on similarly all the way to the front of the bus.

{I have never seen this happen before, and if anybody out there has an idea - do let me know what this is all about.
I guess one could figure out this way if one of the passengers came on the bus directly after overloading at a nearby Churascoria - might be a federal offense in Brazil as this could turn into a significant disturbance to other peaceful passengers. My first thoughts were a check for a concealed weapon, but that makes no sense. Maybe a way to gauge for hyper tension (would have been the Down then) or for taking some constipation inducing medicine.
No idea.}

end of part 1.